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Socioeconomic class and the media

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Depictions of class in US media ' ... of working-class leads. Ralph Cramden ... Often connect poor and working class with negative depictions, low culture ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Socioeconomic class and the media


1
Socioeconomic class and the media
2
Socioeconomic class
  • The United States has been called a classless
    society
  • What does that mean?
  • Is it true?
  • What is class, anyway?

3
Socioeconomic class
  • CLASS. Most sociologists use the term to refer to
    socioeconomic differences between groups of
    individuals which create differences in their
    life chances and power.
  • (http//ryoung001.homestead.com/Sociology.html)

4
Depictions of class in US media
  • The belief that the United States is a classless
    society or, alternatively, that most Americans
    are middle class persists . . . despite
    pervasive socioeconomic stratification
  • (Bullock, Wyche and Williams, 2001)

5
Media facilitate classless society myth by
  • Presenting the interests of the well-off (e.g.,
    stock, financial portfolios, and leisure time) as
    general concerns
  • Downplaying the structural economic concerns
    (e.g., job security, income) of the working class
    and poor, and
  • Emphasizing shared interclass concerns (e.g.,
    safety, crime)

6
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8
Example
  • Many media stories talk about the economy
    overall, citing recovery etc. but do not look
    at the differential class-based effect of various
    policies and events

9
  • By dedicating little broadcast time or print
    space to stories that openly discuss class
    privilege, class-based power differences, and
    inequalities, the poor are either rendered
    invisible or portrayed in terms of
    characterological deficiencies and moral failings
    (e.g., substance abuse, crime, sexual,
    availability, violence).

10
Prime Time programming
  • Early television included a number of
    working-class leads
  • Ralph Cramden
  • Marty
  • More recent examples
  • All in the Family
  • Roseanne

11
  • However, the tone of Prime Time is heavily
    white-collar/professional or upper class
  • The main exceptions are law enforcement personnel
    in cop shows, reality shows and daytime talk
    shows
  • Often connect poor and working class with
    negative depictions, low culture

12
Depictions of drug crimes
  • Although the typical drug consumer and dealer
    is an employed, high-school-educated European
    American man, the majority of arrests depicted on
    reality-based crime programs involve African
    American and Latino men in densely populated,
    urban areas (Anderson, 1994).

13
Tabloid news shows
  • Tabloid news shows tended to focus on stories
    involving upper-class criminals, particularly
    celebrities, whereas highbrow news programs
    were more likely to focus on stories involving
    working-class, unemployed criminals.
  • Also tend to show rags to riches stories or the
    hollowness of wealth

14
  • Limited number of stories on poverty on national
    newscasts.
  • 11 per network per year 1981 to 1986

15
Two categories of stories(Entman, 1995)
  • 239 stories
  • 39 depicted poverty as a source of threat (e.g.,
    crime, drugs, and gangs)
  • 61 portrayed poverty in terms of suffering (e.g.
    racial discrimination, poor health, and
    inadequate medical care)

16
Two frames(Iyengar, 1990)
  • Episodic frame
  • Personal circumstances of a poor individual or
    family
  • More common
  • Thematic frame
  • Abstract, impersonal approach that looks at
    general poverty trends and public assistance

17
Framing effects
  • Those exposed to episodic frames in an experiment
    were more likely to blame the poor for their own
    poverty and to perceive them as responsible for
    improving their socioeconomic status. Those
    exposed to thematic frames tended to make
    structural attributions for poverty and to regard
    the government as responsible for social change.

18
Framing effects
  • Those exposed to episodic frames in an experiment
    were more likely to blame the poor for their own
    poverty and to perceive them as responsible for
    improving their socioeconomic status. Those
    exposed to thematic frames tended to make
    structural attributions for poverty and to regard
    the government as responsible for social change.

19
  • Welfare recipients are among the . . . the most
    hated and stereotyped groups in contemporary
    society
  • Only one among 17 stereotyped groups (feminists,
    housewives, retarded people, Blacks, migrant
    workers, etc.) that respondents both disliked and
    disrespected.
  • Lacking both competence and warmth
  • However, most common group of welfare recipients
    is poor children
  • Media representations concentrate on their mothers

20
Content analysis of Newsweek 1993-1995
  • De Goede (1996) found that the language used in
    the articles reinforced strong ingroup-outgroup
    class-based distinctions, simultaneously
    extolling the moral superiority of the middle
    class while degrading the values and behaviors of
    the poor.
  • Single African American mothers and teenage
    mothers often the focus of these negative articles

21
Depictions of welfare mothers
  • immoral and neglectful, responsible for their
    own poverty as well as the breakdown of the
    nuclear family
  • the poster mother for welfare reform spends her
    days painting her nails, smoking cigarettes, and
    feeding Pepsi to her baby

22
Teenage mothers
  • Content analysis of over 700 newspaper and
    magazine stories
  • Two types of stories
  • Wrong girl stories emphasized flawed psychology
    of teenage mothers
  • Wrong family stories focused on violation of
    traditional two-parent ideal

23
Soap operas
  • On soap operas, single mothers are typically
    portrayed as White, upper-middle-class
    professionals, with nurturing male friends and an
    abundance of reliable child care providers
    (Larson, 1996).
  • Teenage girls who were heavy viewers of soap
    operas were more likely than lighter viewers to
    underestimate the relationship between single
    motherhood and poverty and to overestimate the
    percentage of single mothers in high-paying jobs.

24
Connection to race
  • Content analyses show a great overrepresentation
    of African Americans in depictions of the poor
  • Gilens (1996) content analysis of three major
    news magazines found African Americans were
    represented in 62 of stories about poverty
    though they comprised 29 of poor (no more info
    available)
  • Asian Americans, stereotyped as hard working and
    conscientious, rarely show up in stories about
    the poor
  • European Americans greatly overestimate the
    percentage of African Americans who are poor

25
Stereotypes in media and popular culture
  • African American menmembers of threatening and
    violent underclass
  • African American womenwelfare queens or as
    ignorant, promiscuous women caught in a
    self-perpetuating cycle of dependency
  • Emphasis on African Americans tends to render
    white poor invisible in popular culture

26
Post welfare reform
  • April-July 1999 newspapers
  • 412 articles
  • 24 contained at least some overt discussion of
    race/ethnicity
  • African American articles
  • 8 focused on chronic poverty and single
    motherhood
  • 5 focused on fraud
  • 6 highlighted the lives of African Americans who
    had triumphed over poverty

27
Welfare reform
  • 60 of articles took balanced/neutral tone
  • 32 positive (supported services and programs for
    the poor)
  • 8 negative (fraud, drug addiction, etc.)

28
Welfare recipients
  • 60 portrayed poor as deserving of support
    (hard-working families with children in need)
  • 17 portrayed poor negatively (drug users,
    neglectful parents)
  • 14 neutral
  • 8 mixed
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